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Last weekend NASCAR driver Carl Edwards steered his 3,400-lb. stock car into the car of fellow driver Brad Keselowski. Both were going about 180 m.p.h. Earlier in the race, Keselowski had bumped Edwards, sending him to the garage; Edwards admitted he was seeking revenge. Keselowski's car flipped in the air before crashing hood-down against the ground. Somehow Keselowski walked away unscathed. And somehow, NASCAR did not suspend Edwards for the next Sprint Cup race, to take place March 21 in Bristol, Tenn. He wasn't docked any of the points that determine the season champion...
Gossage felt NASCAR made the right decision. His friend was perplexed. If two games for a punch seems lenient, how can you justify no punishment for attacking an opponent with a potentially deadly race car? "The rule in basketball is, you don't get to punch another player in the face," says Gossage. "The rule in racing is that this is O.K. There are just different standards and codes and things like that." But Gossage admitted, "I understand how outrageous this appears to folks who don't follow the sport." (Read a Q&A with Jimmie Johnson on breaking NASCAR...
...sitting at home and watching it on TV ... two Sundays from now." On March 9, when NASCAR announced its ruling, Petty told the New York Times, "This is one of the saddest days I've ever experienced in the sport." This is a man who knows sadness on the race track: Petty's son Adam was killed during a 2000 NASCAR practice run. (See pictures of 50 years of the Daytona...
...Even worse, as races became more staid, ratings declined and attendance dipped - and not all of it can be attributed to the recession. In 2009 attendance fell about 10%; this year's Feb. 14 Fox broadcast of the Daytona 500 was the lowest-rated Great American Race since 1991. "You can't watch these races without seeing swaths of empty seats in the superspeedways," says David Carter, executive director of the Sports Business Institute at the University of Southern California. (See the photo-essay "A Steam-Powered Car Sets a Land Speed Record...
...problem is NASCAR's policing, claim some racing insiders. "They were micromanaging the sport to death," says Fox NASCAR analyst and 1989 Daytona 500 champ Darrell Waltrip. "We weren't at a crossroads - we were on the wrong road. We went from race cars to safe cars, and it was turning people off." NASCAR admitted as much, and in January the circuit announced that it was loosening its grip. "Boys, have at it," said Robin Pemberton, NASCAR's vice president of competition...